Commentary Culture Investigations

by Jennifer Smith Richards and Jodi S. Cohen

ProPublica is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up for Dispatches, a newsletter that spotlights wrongdoing around the country, to receive our stories in your inbox every week.

A former Chicago police officer facing trial for perjury and forgery has admitted he lied under oath dozens of times when he used an audacious alibi to get out of numerous speeding tickets and other traffic violations. Over more than a decade, he repeatedly blamed an ex-girlfriend for stealing his car and racking up the tickets — and each time, the story was bogus.

Jeffrey Kriv, one of Chicago’s most prolific drunk-driving enforcers during his more than 25 years as a cop, was sentenced to 18 months’ probation and ordered to pay $4,515 in restitution after pleading guilty last week to a lesser charge of felony theft. A plea agreement with prosecutors in Cook County, where Chicago is located, allowed Kriv to avoid jail time and ended the criminal case against him, but the implications of his actions go far beyond his own case.

A ProPublica analysis of court and police records has found that prosecutors have dropped at least 92 traffic and criminal cases that were based on arrests Kriv made and tickets he wrote. Most of the cases that were dismissed involved drunk and dangerous driving. Defense attorneys in those cases have cited Kriv’s perjury case and his credibility issue.

ProPublica and the Chicago Tribune previously detailed Kriv’s history of alleged misconduct as an officer, including that he’d been investigated at least 26 times over allegations of dishonesty for falsifying records, making false arrests and other matters. He was the subject of nearly 100 complaints from citizens and fellow officers in his career; most officers face far fewer.

Kriv denied the allegations in many of those cases and blamed others on how often he made stops and arrests. In the end, many of the investigations could not be pursued because his accusers did not sign formal complaints, and some complaints, including those that involved allegations of dishonesty, were not sustained by police oversight officials. In other cases, oversight officials found Kriv responsible for the misconduct.

He retired in 2023, just before prosecutors charged him.

Kriv’s plea deal was filed in Cook County court on Sept. 24, about a week before his case was scheduled to go to trial. Prosecutors for the Cook County state’s attorney’s office told ProPublica this week that Kriv had 56 of his own traffic tickets dismissed after providing false testimony to judges. That’s more than the 44 tickets that prosecutors had previously indicated in court records. The fines for those tickets would have been $4,515, the amount he was ordered to pay in restitution.

Addressing the fallout from Kriv’s perjury case on other court cases built on his policing, the state’s attorney’s office said it dropped pending cases against individuals who Kriv had arrested or ticketed because it could not proceed without his testimony.

“We could not call him as a witness due to the false statements he previously made in order to have his own personal tickets dismissed,” the office wrote in response to questions from ProPublica. One case was dismissed as recently as August, records show. Prosecutors said there are no pending cases in which Kriv’s testimony is needed.

The state’s attorney’s office said that, going forward, any claims from individuals who had been convicted in Kriv-involved cases will be “carefully reviewed.” There also are defendants who have not shown up in court and have warrants out for their arrests, so their cases could be called again.

“Our priority is to uphold our legal and ethical responsibilities while ensuring fairness,” the office said.

Under the plea agreement, Kriv admitted that he repeatedly blamed a girlfriend for stealing his BMW to get his tickets dismissed. “Well, that morning, I broke up with my girlfriend and she stole my car,” Kriv told one judge. He repeated similar stories again and again to get out of tickets for speeding, parking and red light camera violations involving his personal vehicles. Kriv also provided fraudulent police reports of car thefts as evidence. The judges then dismissed the tickets.

Kriv had been charged with four counts of perjury and five counts of forgery, all of them felonies. Each of those offenses would have been punishable by up to five years in prison.

Kriv’s attorney, Tim Grace, told ProPublica that he and Kriv would not comment.

The executive director of the Policemen’s Annuity and Benefit Fund of Chicago said the pension board will meet to decide if Kriv can continue to collect his pension benefits, given the felony conviction. Illinois law prohibits officers who are convicted of felonies related to their service from receiving pension benefits. Kriv’s pension payment is more than $6,000 a month.

In court last year, Kriv told a ProPublica reporter that he was innocent. “I am going to fight it,” he said at the time. “I don’t plan on taking any plea.” He complained that people accused of carjacking and gun offenses get probation, and he criticized prosecutors for treating him like a criminal. “I’m worse than a carjacker, allegedly,” he said.

He also said “it’s a shame” and “it’s terrible” that prosecutors have dropped cases against alleged drunken drivers and others because of concerns about his credibility. He said he wanted to testify in those cases and said prosecutors had sidelined him prematurely.

“You know how the system is: You are guilty until proven innocent,” he said.

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The Democratic nominee in Colorado’s competitive Eighth Congressional District, Manny Rutinel, frequently leans on his upbringing by a single mother on the campaign trail and in fundraising emails. He has left out any mention of his father, who is part of a powerful, long-running political dynasty in the Dominican Republic. And while the two are estranged, they still hold several similarities, including arrests over left-wing causes and a penchant for socialism, a Washington Free Beacon review found.
His father, César Santiago Rutinel Domínguez—who goes by “Tonty,” Manny’s legal first name—is an accused domestic abuser who has been elected to both chambers of the Dominican Republic’s legislature and was appointed consul general in Colombia immediately after his latest term ended. He has also held leadership positions in the Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) and the Modern Revolutionary Party, affiliates of the Socialist International, a worldwide alliance of left-wing political parties. During one of his failed mayoral bids, he promised to head a “socialist” government.
Manny, a state representative, has never publicly explained his father’s absence during his upbringing and has rarely mentioned him at all. It’s unclear why Manny’s mother moved to the United States when her son was six years old or if Tonty provides any form of child support.
As a University of Florida student, Manny told the Facebook page Humans of UF, “Technically, you could say I come from a broken home.”
“My father, Tonty Rutinel, is a Senator in the Dominican Republic and my entire family over there is political,” he said, noting that his brother and eight half-siblings are all named Tonty. “I guess you could say he has a bit of an ego.”

Tonty isn’t Manny’s only family member who’s held power in the Caribbean nation. Tonty’s cousin is former leftist Dominican president Hipólito Mejía, while his mother, Francisca Otilia Domínguez, served alongside known Marxist-Leninist leaders during a revolution in 1965 and was herself a consul general in Haiti and Panama. Tonty’s brother, Abelardo Antonio Rutinel Domínguez, was a PRD leader, and his nephew—Manny’s first cousin—Abelardo Antonio Rutinel serves in the lower chamber of the Dominican Republic’s legislature.
Manny’s campaign did not comment on his family’s politics or explain the father and son’s estranged relationship.
“Manny has rarely seen or spoken to his father,” a spokesman said in a statement. “He was raised by his single mother, and she’s the person who made him who he is today.”
Details of Manny’s socialist family tree come as the Democrat vies to unseat Rep. Gabe Evans (R.) in Colorado’s Eighth Congressional District, which is expected to be among the closest races in the nation and will play a central role in determining which party controls the House of Representatives. The district has only existed since 2021 and has flipped parties in its only two prior elections.
Tonty, like Manny, became an activist at a young age. He joined the PRD as a teenager and was “imprisoned for defending leftist positions” when he was 15, the local news outlet Diario Libre reported. Manny, meanwhile, began a crusade against animal agriculture in college—lasting until he launched his congressional bid—and was arrested during law school for joining left-wing protesters who stormed the field at the 2019 Yale-Harvard football game to accuse the universities of being “complicit in climate injustice” and chanted, “hey hey, ho ho, fossil fuels have got to go.”
Tonty also ran failed campaigns for Santo Domingo Este, Dominican Republic, mayor in 2010 and 2016. During his first bid, he said, “My government in the city council would be socialist,” and promised to expand taxpayer-funded services, according to Diario Libre, which called him a “legendary member of the PRD.”
Manny likewise began pushing for socialism in blog posts just a few years later. Between 2013 and 2014, he penned headlines like, “What Would Jesus Do? Socialism,” and “Why a More Socialistic Society Is Superior,” the Free Beacon reported.
Manny’s family history isn’t the only part of his past he hopes to bury. He ran to the left of his primary opponent but now says he isn’t a socialist and supports the congressional district’s vast ranching and oil industries. He claimed during a June debate that he abandoned his vegan diet and activism because “it’s important for me to be able to enjoy the delicious products that Colorado ranchers make.”
Tonty has been accused of several violent incidents. In December 2011, he was arrested on domestic violence charges after Leidy Dayanara Caraballo, his girlfriend and mother of one of Manny’s half-siblings, accused him of hitting her on the head and throwing her against a wall, causing an injury that allegedly required 12 stitches—Tonty claimed he accidentally knocked her out of bed and that only two stitches were needed, Listín Diario reported. Prosecutors alleged Tonty had subjected Caraballo to physical and psychological abuse for years.
In February 2012, Tonty filed a lawsuit against Caraballo in an attempt to reduce his monthly child support payments from roughly $1,500 a month down to less than $130, according to Diario Libre. Caraballo’s lawyer called it an attempt to force her to drop the charges. While that effort failed, Caraballo ultimately withdrew her complaint, saying she actually hit her head after slipping on her son’s vomit, Acento reported.
That wasn’t the first time Tonty was accused of violent behavior. In 2005, he got into a heated argument with Alfredo Pacheco, the president of the Chamber of Deputies, the Dominican Republic’s lower chamber, over a bill Tonty wanted on the agenda. Pacheco said Tonty “reached into his pockets, seemingly to pull out a gun,” but bystanders intervened, Hoy reported.
Elsewhere, Tonty in 2021 called to “destroy” the police force and “bury it in the deepest ruins of the earth.” He was also expelled from his own party on two occasions: first in 1987 during a leadership power struggle, and again in 2005 when the party’s secretary general took “a hard line against indiscipline” against members like Tonty, who consistently defied leadership, according to a U.S. embassy cable released by WikiLeaks. He was readmitted both times.
The post Like Father, Like Son: Colorado House Candidate Who Wrote Pro-Socialism Blog Posts Hails From Powerful Socialist Political Dynasty in Dominican Republic appeared first on .

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